So in one of my leagues, I have the 2nd highest scoring team in the league. Unfortunately, I faced 5 teams over the year whom happened to have the highest scoring team for that week. So despite having some of the highest scoring totals in those weeks, I still lost because I played the best team on that given week. I had one bad week in this league (Peyton was on his bye) and this last week of the season I scored the 3rd highest total of the week, but lost to the 2nd highest total score.

I end up with a record of 6-7 which is a travesty in and of itself with how good my team is (Peyton, AD, Moreno, Nelson, etc).

But I thought this wasn't the end of the world, it's a 6 team playoff spot and after last night there was a 6 person tie for the 5th and 6th spots in the playoffs. The tiebreakers are as follows:

1. Best division record (same division only)

2. Head-to-head (in 3 or more team ties, it only applies if one team has beat all the other teams or lost to all the other teams)

3. Most points for.

So I'm thinking great, I should easily have the 5th spot. The 6 teams come from 3 different divisions, which nullifies the first tie-breaker. There is no one who has swept the others with in the 6 teams. It should come down to points, which I am by far and away the top scorer of the 6 teams.

But then I sign on today and I end up in 9th place and out of a playoff spot.

As it turns out, the fact that I have a 2-4 record in my division and the other 6-7 team in my division has a 3-3 record puts me automatically below him? And when the other tie breakers are played out, he hasn't outscored any of the other 6-7 teams, so despite the fact I've outscored all of them, they get placed ahead of my division partner, and because of my division record, I slot one spot behind him!

I've never felt so angered by fantasy football in my life. This team could easily run the playoffs and win the season, but because of a ridiculous amount of bad luck and a horribly designed tie breaking system, I don't even make the playoffs

saint33 wrote:As it turns out, the fact that I have a 2-4 record in my division and the other 6-7 team in my division has a 3-3 record puts me automatically below him? And when the other tie breakers are played out, he hasn't outscored any of the other 6-7 teams, so despite the fact I've outscored all of them, they get placed ahead of my division partner, and because of my division record, I slot one spot behind him!

I've never felt so angered by fantasy football in my life. This team could easily run the playoffs and win the season, but because of a ridiculous amount of bad luck and a horribly designed tie breaking system, I don't even make the playoffs

I agree, that's a lousy design for fantasy football. A case can be made for head-to-head if you want to go that route, but the record within a division is just stupid (IMO) when you have teams from multiple divisions who are vying for the final spots. Especially as the first tie-breaker! Personally, I think most points scored should be the immediate tie-breaker after the overall records, because that's the name of the game in fantasy football... scoring points.

Unfortunately, all you can do now is lobby for a rule change next year.

That's designed by someone taking fantasy way too literally. That's how NFL tiebreakers work. ie, if there was a 4-way tie for a wild card between GB, Chicago, NYG and Philly, the rules first determine best within division between GB/CHI and NYG/PHI, then match up the winners. That's all fine and good for the NFL, but even having divisions in fantasy is stupid.

Same thing happened to a guy in one of my leagues. He has the second highest points in the league but will miss the playoffs because he's third in the division and the playoffs are: two division champs and one wildcard from each division. What makes it worse is the other division is so sad, someone with a LOSING record is going to make the playoffs. I already told the league we need to change it next year.

glg wrote: That's all fine and good for the NFL, but even having divisions in fantasy is stupid.

+1. There is no travel in FF, no point having divisions IMO. I've had bad luck with the losing with 2nd highest score of the week before, but the first tiebreaker in all the leagues I've been in is total score.

Crax wrote:
+1. There is no travel in FF, no point having divisions IMO. I've had bad luck with the losing with 2nd highest score of the week before, but the first tiebreaker in all the leagues I've been in is total score.

There's also the historical rivalries in NFL divisions due to a lot of the teams having been in the same divisions for decades.

The first tiebreaker being divisional record was the part that jumped out at me as just too literal.

My money league plays divisions on yahoo. And what happens there is, the final tiebreakers don't apply until the last regular season matchup. The first tiebreaker for division is div record, but in the regular season it seems to lay that out based on points. So you think you are getting hosed, but it comes out right in the end. I sure am glad we have divisions this year, I won a weak division, if it was just 1-12, I wouldn't have a prayer at 7-6-1.